RUSH: Remember the story that Donald Trump kicked babies out of his convention and hates babies? I go back to Mr. Rutenberg’s story in the New York Times today — or Sunday, yesterday — where he claims that the media is so outraged over what Trump represents and the danger Trump poses, they have to throw everything they’ve ever learned, everything they’ve ever been taught out the window. And they must assume, for the first time in their careers, an “oppositional” position. Never before has the Drive-By Media opposed anyone.
They have been objectively reporting on all candidacies and all campaigns and letting the chips fall. But this? This is so bad, this is so overwhelmingly dangerous that they have had to step outside every limit they’ve ever known and been taught. They’ve had to throw objectivity out the window. They’ve had to throw fairness out the window and do nothing but make sure Trump doesn’t get anywhere near the nuclear codes ’cause he’s unstable, he’s unfit, he doesn’t have the right temperament — and they’ve gotta save America!
And he then went on to say (paraphrased), “The danger in this is that we end up supporting Trump’s opponent,” as though it’s an afterthought (chuckles), as though it’s an accident. “So we only appear to being supporting Hillary because we’re so opposed to Trump. We’re so, so committed to defeating Trump that of course it looks like we’re supporting Hillary, and that’s not good for journalism.” It’s also not good for America, Jim, when you get right down to it.
But the Trump-hates-babies stories. The fact is the whole thing was made up. Trump told a joke. There was a lady in the crowd and the baby was crying. He made a joke about getting her out. “No, keep her. We love babies.” He went on and on. The baby didn’t leave; the mother didn’t leave. Nobody had to leave. Trump didn’t force anybody to leave. He does not hate babies. But for a week, the story was out there that Trump hates babies.
It finally got so bad, it was so over the top, that the fact checker at the Washington Post (a guy by the name of Glenn Kessler) had to do a story debunking it. But it was too little, too late. It was after a week. Now, that wasn’t journalism; that was strictly lies told over and over, embellished over and over. The whole thing was made up. But the damage was done, and it just… The thing that’s always amazed me about things like this, is I try to put myself in the position of being a low-information person.
It’s hard to do, admittedly. But I try to think as somebody other than what I am. I’m deeply enmeshed and involved in all this, and I try to ask myself, “Okay, if I’m minding my own business — I’m playing Pokemon, or I’m out there playing Xbox One, I’m playing whatever — and I’m watching E! Entertainment TV, and all of a sudden I see a news story that Donald Trump, Republican presidential candidate, hates babies. I just can’t imagine automatically believing it. I can’t imagine sitting there going, ‘My God, this guy’s a reprobate! He hates babies! Mabel, did you hear that? There’s a guy running for president who hates babies. We — we — we gotta stop it!'”
I know there are people that react that way, but I just cannot fathom it. (sigh) (interruption) Well, I know, it’s the same thing whenever I hear, “Did you hear that, Mabel? Donald Trump is out there and he hates… He literally hates! He hates Muslims and he hates the Mexicans. Do you believe that?” And people go, “Oh, man.” There’s no suspicion in these people minds. There’s no curiosity. There’s no, “That sounds over the top.”
But they… I guess they succeeded in that narrative that Trump hates babies. (interruption) Well… (sigh) (interruption) Well… (interruption) Nah, I… (interruption) That’s… (interruption) See, Snerdley just said something to me, and I don’t believe that. Snerdley said to me that even the journalists who didn’t see it believed it. (interruption) He did? Ron Fournier apologized? Holy smokes! Ron Fournier apparently believed the story was right that Trump hates babies, was kicking babies out of his appearances, and turned out to be wrong, and so he apologized on Twitter for believing…? (interruption) For assuming that it was true.
Well, then he hadn’t seen the story, just assumed it was right. Well, then he’s a low-information voter. (groans) That just boggles my mind. But, see, I know it is a reality, even though I can’t relate to it and that’s so sad, that you can make people believe this garbage. Here’s the case of an informed Drive-By reporter. I saw something else here. It was on CNN. Trump’s speech to the Economic Club of Detroit is finished, and they had some guy from Wall Street on there.
He looked like he was a billionaire, eminently successful guy from some investment house or some such thing — and he was about 60, it looked like — and his complaint was that Trump didn’t say anything about the minimum wage. And my reaction was, “The guy knows the minimum wage is a phony baloney, plastic banana, good-time rock ‘n’ roller, do-nothing issue! He has to know it,” and then I got to thinking: “How many of these people know that what they’re promoting and what they’re saying is abjectly wrong?”
Everything people think about the minimum wage is wrong. It actually raises standards of living? It doesn’t do anything of the sort, and I maintain they know it. But I may be wrong. Even though they might be billionaires or millionaires, it’s just as likely that they’re just as stupid and think things that are dead wrong about economics, even though they somehow have succeeded.